Lindsay Lohan, the troubled American actress who hoped to kick-start her film
career with her portrayal of Elizabeth Taylor, has been derided by reviewers
for her "wooden" and "inadvertently hysterical" performance.

It was the role that troubled American actress Lindsay Lohan hoped would relaunch a career derailed by stints in jail and in rehab.

Making her comeback as Elizabeth Taylor, the late British-born film legend who like her was a former child star with her fair share of off-screen woes, seemed a perfect fit, she told interviewers.

So Lohan's advisers may want to keep her eyes away from the reviews now coming in for Liz & Dick, a made-for-television drama about Taylor's tempestuous relationship with Richard Burton that will screen on Showtime on Sunday night.

One of the gentler ones comes from her hometown newspaper of Newsday. "Lohan's no Taylor (not that anyone is or ever could be)," notes the reviewer, starting off relatively softly before then unleashing his barbs.

"But poor Linds doesn't stand a chance. As seen here, her skills are rudimentary – made rustier by a long absence and a lot of other extra-curricular activities.

"She delivers lines dutifully, competently, and at times woodenly, but she also looks like someone who has to think about what she has to say before she says it."

Yet that verdict on her acting skills is almost in the positive category compared to the skewering that Lohan receives from The Hollywood Reporter, the influential film industry insider.

"Lohan is woeful as Taylor from start to finish. But, whatever you do, don't miss Liz & Dick. It's an instant classic of unintentional hilarity," notes the review under a headline calling the film "half train wreck, half skit".

It continues: "The best part is that it gets worse as it goes on, so in the right company with the right beverages, Liz & Dick could be unbearably hilarious toward the tail end of the 90-minute running time."

Lohan's portrayal of Taylor is so melodramatically overwrought that it is "impossible not to laugh" as it is "inadvertently hysterical".

Lohan, 26, had fought hard for the role after two years away from the cameras during which she spent three months at the Betty Ford rehab clinic and was charged with stealing a necklace and violating her probation by failing to perform her community service.

A judge sentenced her to 30 days in jail, but she was released after less than five hours because of overcrowding in Californian prisons. And gossip column headlines about her excesses have perpetuated her "bad girl" reputation.

"I fought to get the role in Liz & Dick because I related to her so much because of her position in the public eye and the media obsession with her, and the ups and downs in her relationships and life. And that's aside from her love for diamonds!" she told the Daily Mirror last week.

Lohan made her debut as a child fashion model aged just three and appeared in her first film at 11.

Taylor, who died last year aged 79, made her first film when she was nine years old. Two of her eight marriages were to Burton, the Welsh screen heart-throb with whom she also co-starred 11 times on screen.